Maybe You're My Second Chance
by Cellytron
Summary: Psycho II. When all was said and done, and the cobwebs in her mind had been swept away by morphine and the smell of Lysol and the taste of bad hospital food, one thing was starkly clear to Mary Loomis: "Answering the door might have been the biggest mistake of my life." Slight Norman/Mary, some violence, a lot of motherly head games.


When all was said and done, and the cobwebs in her mind had been swept away by morphine and the smell of Lysol and the taste of bad hospital food, one thing was starkly clear to Mary Loomis:

_ Answering the door_ _might have been the biggest mistake of my life. _

But then again, _why_ shouldn't she have answered the door? It was a beautiful, peaceful afternoon. She was alone in the house, true... but then most people don't get murdered in broad daylight.

Even here. Even at Bates Motel.

She felt safe.

She felt complacent.

She should have been waiting for the other shoe to drop.

_And drop it did. _

* * *

As soon as the shock wore off, she felt strong enough to shift over to irritation. Anger. Indignation.

"Mother," she snapped, "I told you not to come here. I _told_ you you'd be _sorry_-"

Lila's response was to roughly shove her daughter aside and barrel into the front hall. Her head whipped around like a hunted animal's. Her eyes were red, ringed by dark circles. She had been crying.

"He isn't here, Mother," Mary said, loudly enough to have brought him running. If he was there. But he _wasn't_ there, and Mary found herself strangely grateful for that fact. Because he didn't know. Somehow, he _still_ didn't know.

"Where the hell is he?!" demanded Lila.

"How should I know-"

"You had better hope you aren't hiding him!"

"Mother, you're being ridiculous-"

"I'm! I'M being ridiculous?! I'm not the one trying to protect a MURDERER!"

Mary rolled her eyes. She was long out of patience for Lila and her games.

"How could I hide him when I didn't even know you were coming? Look, can you just go? He might be back any minute!"

"Where is he now?" Lila sounded more reasonable.

"I don't know. I went shopping for some groceries and when I came back, he was gone. I suppose he went into town or something." Mary gestured toward the kitchen, where it was obvious something was burning. "Now can you please go back to the hotel? I've got something on the stove. I'll call you later, I promise."

"I'd rather wait."

"Mother, are you crazy?"

Lila was quiet for a moment.

"I must be," she admitted. "I really must be."

"You're not kidding!" Mary cried. "But he might be back any minute, now will you please-"

The back door slammed. Mary wheeled back around and met her mother's eyes.

"It's him, I told you-"

"Mary?" Norman's voice.

"I told you!" Mary hissed. "Hurry up and go. I'll call you tonight, I promise-"

"Mary?" Norman called again. "Hey, Mary? Something's burning on the stove! Where are you?"

"I'll be right there, Norman!" Mary sent a pleading look toward her mother.

"You really _are_ trying to protect him," Lila said in a hushed voice.

"I'm trying to protect YOU!"

"Oh, so I need protection?"

"Who knows! With everything you've pulled..."

Lila was staring over Mary's shoulder, and with a wince, Mary turned toward the kitchen doorway.

Norman Bates had come up behind the two women as quietly as a man half his size. He took in the scene before him with careful deliberation. When he spoke, it was in a voice thick with pain.

"Oh my god. It's true. Dr. Raymond told me, but I didn't believe him. You two? Together? Trying to drive me out of my mind?"

"Norman-" Mary broke off. What could she possibly say? He _knew_. He knew now, and he would never look at her the same way again. And, perhaps, now their lives were truly in danger. He was hurt. He was deeply hurt, betrayed. He had killed before, and pain had driven him to it. Pain like this? She could only pray not.

"Drive you _back_ out of your mind, you mean!" Lila was shouting.

"It's... it's true," he repeated, his eyes on Mary.

"Norman... Norman, I'm so sorry..."

"Don't you dare apologize to him!" snapped Lila. "Don't you dare!"

"Norman, I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" Mary was practically shrieking, and she began to approach the tall man, arms outstretched. "Norman, please, I can explain... I didn't want to hurt you, I never wanted to hurt you, I swear-"

Lila roughly grabbed her daughter by the shoulder, spun her around and, with a grunt, delivered a ringing slap to her cheek. Norman made an impulsive, protective movement toward the younger woman, but something made him stop short. Something in Lila Loomis' hand.

Lila laughed despite herself, a short, barking cackle.

"What a picture perfect couple you are. Both mad as damned hatters. Well, I hope you're happy, both of you."

"Lila," Norman said in a shaky voice, "Get out of my house before I call the police."

"The _police_?! Before YOU call the police?! I already called the police, Bates! They're on their way right this moment. I wouldn't show up _here_ without protection."

"Mother, why did you call the police?!" Mary hissed. "Norman hasn't done anything!"

Lila looked at Mary with exasperation.

"Norman tried to kill you."

"What are you talking about?!"

"You were afraid for your life. Bates couldn't resist a pretty young woman. He seduced you, and then he was going to kill you. Just like he killed your aunt."

"You're crazy!" Mary, rather boldly, took several steps between her mother and Norman. "You're crazy."

"I'm not crazy, dear. It's a mother's intuition! After we last spoke, I could tell you were afraid. Terrified. Terrified of _him_! Well, what else could I do but come to the rescue?"

Mary shook her head with weariness. "Alright, fine, you came to the rescue, now will you please go back to your hotel?"

Norman, disgusted, turned away from them... but a moment later, in the still silence of the late afternoon, he heard the unmistakable sound of a revolver cocking behind him.

"Mother!" Mary was screaming now. "Mother, put that gun away, are you insane?!"

Norman turned back.

"Put the gun away?! Of course not! I came here to _save_ you, dear! To save you from that maniac!" Lila cried. "And what I had to do, I did in self-defense! To save you, and to save my own life, from that _MONSTER_!"

"Lila," Norman said with that same coolness that Mary had found so attractive at the diner, "Put that down. No one needs to get hurt."

"No one _needed to get hurt_ twenty two years ago!"

"Mother!" Mary cried, "Stop it!"

"No one needed to _die_ twenty two years ago! That's the difference between then and now. Someone... _BADLY_... needs to die, right now."

"Mother!"

"You could have stopped this, Mary!" Lila's hand was steady. "Bates didn't have to die. He could have gone back into the institution, if you had just stuck to the plan, if you had just listened to Mother. Will you be able to live with this? Because I damn sure will."

Sirens were approaching. Lila nodded toward the door.

"That's the police now." Lila waved her other hand toward Mary, beckoning her over. "Mary, come over here, answer the door."

A smirk.

"And you, Norman? I'm sure there's a door waiting for you, too, in Hell."

_"Mother, stop it-"_

She fired.

* * *

Mary was thrown backward with the force of the gunshot. She collapsed against a stunned Norman. She was as limp as a corpse, though she was still breathing ragged, shallow breaths. Norman quickly grabbed her under her arms and gently lowered her to the floor. Within seconds, her sweater was wet with thick, soupy blood.

Norman easily laid her slight frame over his legs, resting her head on his lap. She was shaking uncontrollably and blinking up at him, unable to focus her eyes, completely disoriented. A trickle of blood ran from the corner of her mouth.

Lila Loomis let out a single, piercing shriek of pure agony, and she dropped the gun on the floor, collapsed to her knees, and dug her nails into her scalp. As the police officers scaled the steps up to the door, she tore out a fistful of hair.

"_You bastard, you monster_, you _killed_ her!" Lila howled, _"YOU KILLED MY BABY!"_

* * *

When the police arrived inside moments later and took in the strange sight in the front hall of the Bates house, naturally the first suspect was Bates himself. Bates. Stunned, speechless, covered in the blood of a young girl. _Another_ young girl.

And then, there was the girl's mother, crumpled on the floor, repeating again and again, _"You killed her, you killed her, you killed her,"_ until she no longer had breath for speech.

Well, clearly, Bates was guilty again.

It was, ultimately, only the testimony of the poor girl herself, Lila Loomis' "baby", that spared Norman Bates another arrest.

"What the hell happened here?!" demanded the officer.

Bates wasn't able to speak. He looked profoundly guilty.

"Lila..." Mary gasped suddenly, "Lila did it... shot me... she wanted to..." a painful breath.

"Hold on. What do you mean, Miss? It was your mother?! Your mother _shot_ you?!" asked the disbelieving deputy. "In Norman Bates' house?!"

"Y-yeah..."

"Are you sure?!"

_"Ask... Norman."_

The last coherent words spoken that afternoon.

* * *

Norman Bates hadn't been home in three days. He hadn't showered or slept. He had barely eaten. He was making quite a nuisance of himself around the 4th floor nurse's station.

"When will she wake up?" he asked the cranky night nurse for the seventh time that day.

"_When she wakes up."_ The same terse response he had gotten six times before.

* * *

On the fourth day, she woke up.

* * *

The motel had been left unlocked and unattended for a full month. Looters, convinced of the inherent value of every single material object in the building-

_("You know that Bates place where that crazy lady shot her daughter? Well, this is a genuine ashtray from that Bates place. You want it? Ha! Put down that fifty, unless you got another one just like it!")_

-had ransacked the place and left almost nothing behind.

Norman saw the state of things in his motel, acknowledged it, and then got into the car where Dr. Raymond was waiting.

* * *

"Lila Loomis is going to stand trial in October," said Dr. Raymond in his customary no-nonsense way. "I think it would go a long way toward putting her behind bars if Mary could testify."

"What about me?" asked Norman shakily.

"You? You want to testify?"

"Well, sure. I'm the one she wanted to shoot."

"You think that's a good idea? Being on the stand?"

Norman fiddled with the car's ashtray, opening and closing it.

"I don't know," he said honestly. "Do you think Mary will testify?"

Raymond blew the smoke from his cigarette out the window.

"You'd know that better than I would."

A few miles passed in silence.

"It's like she just snapped, isn't it?" asked Norman. "Lila Loomis, I mean. Like they say, crazy people snap. Like they said I snapped. But I didn't snap."

"No, we talked about that, didn't we? There's no such thing as a snap. Trauma is like a scarf being pulled from both ends, unraveling. It builds and builds for years, the pain. Breaking apart a little more day by day, until there's nothing left to keep it together, in one piece. And then..."

Norman nodded.

"I guess I can see how it happened. I guess I even... feel a little sorry for her."

"For Lila?"

"For Lila."

They were only a few miles from the hospital.

"Norman..." Raymond took another puff of his cigarette. "Are you sure you want her to keep living with you?"

"Mary?" asked Norman. "Well, of course, why wouldn't I?"

"Well, considering she and her mother conspired against you to send you back into the institution and her mother nearly shot you in cold blood... you're being awfully big about this. And awfully naive."

"Doctor, Mary never wanted to hurt me. She only did it because..." Norman trailed off. "She took that bullet for me, Doctor. I owe her my life. The least I can do is take care of her now."

"...I suppose."

"If it hadn't been for her... no, Doctor, I don't think I'm being naive. I just think I know where she's coming from."

"You mean, because of her mother?"

"I did a few crazy things because of my mother, too."

* * *

"Norman, I'm fine, you don't have to keep fussing over me." Mary's voice was still hoarse from all the tubes, and still quite weak, despite over a month of rehabilitation and wholesome (disgusting) hospital food.

At the moment, Norman was fixing her covers for the third time since he had brought her tea.

"Oh, I... I don't mind. Fussing over you, that is."

"Well, you're driving me nuts. Just sit down. I need to talk to you."

Norman could hardly stop looking at her. At how pale she was, at how frail she looked. He had put her to bed in the setting sun, and now, in the light of the single bedside lamp, she looked almost ghostly.

The operation had been a risky one. Mary Loomis, age 22, had nearly expired on the table. It was only thanks to her youth, good health, and the fact that the bullet wedged itself just above her heart, that she was alive to tell about it.

"Shot, almost to death, by her own mother," the doctor had said with a grim shake of his head. "Like a horror movie."

Norman smoothed down the top sheet one last time, then dragged the wooden chair over to her bedside, where he planned to spend the night watching over her, just as he had done in the hospital. She wouldn't take a single breath without him noticing.

And it made Mary profoundly uncomfortable.

"Norman, really, I appreciate... stop it!"

Norman's guilty hand had reached out, without thinking, to fluff her pillow. Again.

"Looked kinda flat," he muttered.

"It's not flat, it's fine, now will you please listen to me?"

"Yes."

"Norman, I'm thinking I should testify against my mother."

"I'll testify too," Norman said automatically. "On your behalf, of course!"

The gravity of his gesture was not lost on Mary, not at all. Norman, who hated crowds, who hated reporters, who had spent enough time in a courtroom to last ten men the rest of their lives, was willing to testify against Lila Loomis in defense of himself... and of the frail young woman who had lived under her thumb for twenty two years.

"Norman, are you sure?" Mary whispered, deeply touched.

"I've got to."

"No one would think any less of you if you stayed home. Hell, I wish _I_ could stay home. I can't imagine what it's going to be like, facing her like that."

Norman smiled.

"You won't have to do it alone. Dr. Raymond will testify, too. And we'll get a good lawyer. The phone's been ringing constantly. Every day, some new hotshot lawyer is calling up, wanting to take the case."

"No kidding?" Mary laughed a little.

"They're calling it the trial of the century. I think that's a little silly... but a lot of them are offering to do it for free."

"Now, isn't that nice?" Mary asked wistfully. "See, Norman, you've got the whole world believing in you now."

"Well, yeah... I guess I do. But I think most of them just want to defend a... a pretty girl like you."

* * *

It was after midnight. Mary woke up out of a peaceful dream, to see Norman still sitting by her bedside.

He was too good to her. _Far too good._

Her guilt threatened to boil over, and she coughed to let him know she was awake. Instantly, he made ready to jump up. She painfully reached out and caught Norman's hand, pulling him back down.

She took a deep breath and closed her eyes.

The moment of truth.

"Norman... I'm so sorry. None of this should have happened. I should have stopped Lila before-"

"Mary, it isn't your fault!" Norman cried.

"It's my fault alright. The notes. Moving all that furniture. Lying about my name. Lying about everything."

"Mary, you stood in front of a bullet for me!"

"Well, I had to! My mother would have-"

"I know that." He shook his head. "And, in a way, your mother was right. It would have looked like... like self-defense. Who would even think to question it?"

"Yeah," Mary mumbled. "That's Lila. Once she gets going, there's no stopping her."

"But _you_ stopped her. And you saved my life, Mary. Come on, I won't forget that."

Mary gave him a small smile, but then she said, "I don't know, Norman. Maybe it would have been better if... if we'd never met."

Norman squeezed her hand, hard.

"Ow," Mary complained. She looked at Norman with irritation, but something in his gaze stopped her. His eyes flashed with anger, then he lowered them.

"Don't you ever say that. _Ever._ Mary, when you were lying on the floor, when I thought I was going to lose you..." he met her eyes again, "All I could think about was... was how grateful I was to have met you. You were a friend to me when no one else was. You stayed with me that first night. I don't think anyone else in the world would have stayed here."

"But, Norman, I only did it because Lila-"

"Whatever the reason. You stayed. You have no idea... how much you helped me. You've done nothing but help me since the day we met. Just being back in this house scared the hell out of me. I didn't think I was going to make it. If I'd been alone..." he shook his head. "I can't tell you how that would have been."

"No kidding," Mary half-laughed. "Well, if we're being candid, that... that first night scared the hell out of me, too."

"Why?"

"Oh, mostly that Mr. Toomey. Boy, you wouldn't believe what that bastard said to me the next day. What he thought we were doing. I felt like he was peeking in on me through the window the whole night, waiting to catch me out."

She shrugged.

"But... it wasn't that bad. I knew you were here to protect me."

Norman begrudgingly smiled.

"Oh... oh, sure. I would have protected you."

"I know, because you protected me at the diner."

"Yeah... I guess I did."

"Yeah, I guess you did."

They were quiet again, then Norman sighed.

"Mary, we've both screwed up." He snorted. "A lot."

"...Yeah."

"Dr. Raymond always told me about second chances. Maybe... you're my second chance. And... maybe I'm yours?"

Mary was quiet. Then her lips spread into a weak but genuine smile.

"That might be the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me."


End file.
